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Grenfell Tower: government appoints demolition contractor
Cristina Lago Deputy Editor
Deputy prime minister Angela Rayner confirmed the tower's demolition in February (Image: Google Maps)
The government has announced its intention to award Deconstruct (UK) the £12.25m contract to demolish Grenfell Tower.
A voluntary transparency notice on the government’s procurement website says the Ministry of Housing, Communities & Local Government (MHCLG) made the decision based on “technical reasons” because a change in contractor “would cause significant inconvenience and substantial duplication of costs”.
Deconstruct has been the Grenfell Tower site’s principal contractor, responsible for its structural propping, security and maintenance, site clearance, and weekly monitoring of the building’s condition since 2017. This, MHCLG added, gives the company “unique site knowledge”.
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MHCLG said the value of the modification is less than 50% of the value of the original £24.5m maintenance and safety contract.
The notice added that planned rather than emergency deconstruction of the tower “will minimise disruption to the community” because the use of noisy and percussive approaches will be minimised and dust control will be in place from the outset.
Condition will ‘continue to worsen’
Deputy prime minister Angela Rayner confirmed in February that the remains of Grenfell Tower will be “carefully taken down” to the ground.
The process to demolish the structure will not start before the eighth anniversary of the tragedy in June this year, the government added.
A report prepared by independent experts, including engineers, found that the condition of the tower “will continue to worsen the longer the building is left in place” and it only remains stable because of props and additional measures, the government said.
“Taking the engineering advice into account, the deputy prime minister concluded that it would not be fair to keep some floors of the building that are significant to some families, whilst not being able to do so for others and knowing that, for some, this would be deeply upsetting,” said the government in its February update.
A spokesperson for Grenfell United, a group representing some of the bereaved families and survivors, said that no one supported the plan at a meeting they had with Rayner before she announced the tower’s demolition.
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